Hyundai bets big on futuristic displays, eyes roll-up screen in 3 years

South Korea’s top auto parts maker Hyundai Mobis Co. said on Tuesday it expects to begin mass production of its rollable vehicle display – the first of its kind in the industry – within three years.

Hyundai Mobis, a unit of Hyundai Motor Group, also said it is contacting carmakers in the US and Europe for wider adoption of its roll-up displays in luxury electric vehicles and self-driving cars.

"We expect to see vehicles equipped with (our) rollable displays within 3 years,” said Choi Jin-young, the company’s infotainment display division chief, at the Hyundai Mobis 2023 Media Tech Day.

The company said in April it developed the world’s first roll-up display for the in-vehicle infotainment system, which it claimed would revolutionize the industry by allowing for highly flexible interior design.

At Tuesday’s event held at its Yongin research center, Hyundai Mobis demonstrated various cutting-edge vehicle screens while unveiling its strategies for the business.

Executives said the company aims to achieve $5.35 billion in overseas orders for core auto parts this year, of which automotive displays and other vehicle components will account for $1.83 billion, or a third of the total.

‘INFOTAINMENT DISPLAY’ MAKER

An affiliate of Hyundai Motor Co., the company said it is spending heavily on research and development of new technologies to become a leading infotainment display maker by sourcing panels from display makers and delivering custom-tailored products to carmakers.

Hyundai Mobis invested more than 1 trillion won ($770 million) annually in R&D over the past three years.

Its latest developments include a hologram augmented reality (AR) heads-up display (HUD).

According to a recent tally by the Automotive News, Hyundai Mobis ranked sixth on the top 100 global auto parts supplier list after Germany's Bosch, Japan's Denso, Germany's ZF, Canada's Magna International and China's Contemporary Amperex Technology Limited (CATL).

Excluding CATL, which newly entered the list as the US media outlet included battery makers, Hyundai Mobis is now the world’s fifth-largest auto parts maker. In 2011, the Korean company ranked 10th.

In tandem with the industry’s shift to autonomous driving and electrification, the global automotive display market is expected to grow from $9 billion this year to $14 billion by 2027, according to Display Supply Chain Consultants (DSCC), a display market research firm.

FEATURES OF HYUNDAI’S ROLL-UP DISPLAY

The rollable display form factor had largely been adopted in smartphones and TVs until Hyundai Mobis unveiled its rollable screen for vehicles.

The company said users can adjust the display size depending on the situation. When rolled up, the display takes up minimal space, creating new options for interior design.

The screen can be rolled out to more than 30 inches and offers four driving modes with different screen sizes in quad high-definition (QHD) resolution.

When the vehicle is parked, the screen disappears into its housing. Driving users can roll up the screen to just a third of the display with only the minimum driving information required. The display scales up to two-thirds when navigating. It can be switched to a full-screen mode with a 16:9 aspect ratio to watch videos when the vehicle is parked or when charging an electric vehicle.

In recreational and family vehicles, the display can be mounted on the ceiling between the front and rear seats and folded down, or it can be installed on the side next to the seats, the company said.

In May 2022, Hyundai Mobis also unveiled a curved 34-inch swivel automotive display – the world’s first – that stretches from the driver’s seat to the front passenger’s seat for a wider view.

Write to Sungsu Bae at baebae@hankyung.com

In-Soo Nam edited this article.